January 24, 2018

Last fall the grandson of one of the founders of windsurfing (and 2017 Ultimate Waterman) Zane Schweitzer was in town to help out with a foil clinic put on by Hampton Watersports. I couldn't make it to the clinic, but caught up with Zane the next day and chatted him up. He was friendly and generous of spirit, and mentioned that of all the various windsurfing disciplines "'my favorite things to do windsurfing are wave riding and wave jumping."

Big jumps off of waves are my fantasy. Forget that I haven't had even a medium jump off of a wave in several years...I still dream. And there standing before me was a guy who lived that dream. I asked him "for you, what's a really high jump?"

He thought for a moment, and then said "my favorite thing to do way up in air, is a push loop. A push loop 40 or 50 feet up...I feel I have the best control with those."

I looked at him. He was matter of fact. There was no trace of ego or brag. "40 or 50 feet".

I said "how do you survive the crash from that height?" He was all "dude it's about the landing."

I'll bet it is. Damn.

("Hospital air" is a term I learned from Dana Miller in Hatteras twenty years ago, referring to jumps so high that...well...you get the idea.)